Incipient
by keepcalmandshiptiva94
Summary: Incipient: A beginning, in an early stage. "I really think you would have liked her, if you were still here. I really wish you could have met her, because she means everything to me. I didn't even realize it for the longest time." TxZ two-shot.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: This is basically me taking my drabble from tumblr ( search/drabble) ****and adding and editing to make what will probably be a two-shot. Hope you like it!**

Somehow, no matter how long Tony stared at the single photo, worth much more than the thousands words suggested by many, he couldn't look away. The picture didn't have amazing quality, and it wasn't captured in a special moment, but it was a photo of him and his mother, and he couldn't quit staring at it.

A knock at his door startled him, and he laid the picture on the table in front of him, going to answer his door. He found Ziva on the other side, a pizza in her hands. He felt a small smile tug up the corners of his lips. "You know me too well."

She smiled, walking in as he opened the door wider. As she went to lay the pizza down on his living room table, she took note of the photograph sitting there. "How long have you been staring at it?" she asked, turning back to look at him.

"Too long." His response was simple, and he knew she didn't expect anything more than that. She nodded once, proving him correct, before sitting down on his couch. Something in her eyes softened him, and before he could register the movement of his body, he was sitting beside her, opening the box to grab a piece of pizza.

There was a long silence, but it was comfortable. They sat next to each other, close enough to be in each other's personal space, but not enough so to be strange. The pizza box slowly began to empty, both of them staring at the photo that lied on the table in front of them.

"She was beautiful."

Ziva's voice pulls him out of his trance, and he looks over at her. She's watching him, and part of him feels a rush of affection at the concern in her eyes. He knows it's genuine; there is no doubt about that. They seem to be good like that. They always know what the other needs and when they need it, and they have a system that works for them. Even though part of him feels as if things might slowly be progressing into something that could be more, he doesn't want to jump the gun on this one. He loves the relationship too much to risk anything.

"I know." His voice sounds strange to him, and he tosses a no longer appealing pizza crust into the box. "I know she was."

He turned, leaning his head against the back of the couch, and she mirrored his position.

"Are you okay?" her voice is genuinely concerned, and he isn't sure what the sudden tug at his heart is, but he knows that he isn't nearly ready to try to explain it.

"Yeah, I think so." He sighs. "It just brings back so many memories, and there are so few of them. Now, I have this photo, as simple as it is, to remember her by when I can't remember anymore."

Ziva's knee brushed against his. "You still have a while, I'm sure, before you can't remember."

He chuckled dryly. "Well, I appreciate that." He was silent for a moment, breaking off his connection to her eyes and gazing down at his hands in his lap. "She's why I love movies, you know."

He heard her take a breath. "If I had known that, I would not have made so many snide remarks about all of your references."

"No," he looked back up at her. "It's fine, really. You didn't know, and it didn't bother me, promise. But it was all her. She loved them, and after she died, I just…"

At a loss for words, he looked down at his hands. He felt her hand come to rest on his knee, her thumb rubbing soothing circles. He looked up at her after a moment, feeling strangely like a younger child who needed consoling. "I understand."

He felt his chin tremble and tears gather in his eyes, but instead of feeling ashamed, like he knew he would have around anyone else, he simply gave in when she wrapped her arms around him. He surrendered to his need to be comforted and allowed her to pull him closer. He buried his face in her shoulder, arm wrapping around her waist and holding her close, holding himself together at the same time.

At some point, Tony put in a movie, and they settled on the couch, slightly closer than before, and Tony found himself comforted simply by her being there. When the movie was over, she looked over at him, sighing, before speaking. "I should probably get home."

She stood, and he had spoken before his mind could process the sudden desire he had to be as close to her as possible. "Can you stay?"

She froze where she stood, not meeting his eyes for a moment, and his heart dropped when the realization of what he'd just asked of her sunk in. He opened his mouth to speak, but at that moment, she turned back to him and answered. "Yeah, I can."

He smiled at her, and she smiled in return, heading to his DVD collection. "What movie should we watch next?"

He felt a rush of affection that he couldn't quench, and so when she turned back to look at him after hearing no response, she was taken aback by the emotion in his eyes. He recovered, smiling. "Anything is fine."

She put in Lord of the Rings, and settled back down next to him on the couch, and he tried to keep his attention on the movie. At some point, she laid down, putting her head in his lap, and though the motion surprised him, he simply ran his fingers through her hair.

The tenderness in the gesture came easily, and he found that it felt right, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

He looked down at her, smiling, because hey, maybe it was supposed to be.

When the ending credits rolled, he looked down to see that Ziva had fallen asleep, and he gingerly lifted her head and got up, only to lift her in his arms and carry her to his bedroom. She stirred, and her arms came up to wrap around his neck and she snuggled her face into his neck. It was probably the cutest thing he'd ever seen, and the second cutest thing he'd ever seen came when he went to lay her down on what had, over the years, been established as her side of the bed. She gripped his shirt in her half asleep mentality, and he had to physically remove her hands from his shirt.

He lay on his side of the bed for the longest time, staring at the ceiling. His mother's face lingered in his mind, and he felt tears gathering in his eyes again. He cast a glance over at his sleeping partner, and wondered what his mother would have thought about her. He figured she would have liked her, because he did, and he was a lot like his mother, at least from what he could remember.

Regardless, he felt an overwhelming gratefulness toward her at the moment, because when nobody else had noticed his distant behavior, she had, and she'd showed up at his apartment with pizza and a listening ear, which was exactly what he'd needed.

They wound up together in the center of his bed, just like they had in Paris, and when she woke up once, stirring in his arms, she didn't detangle herself from him or run, like they had a history of doing.

Instead, she snuggled closer, resting her head underneath his chin, and he couldn't help but smile to himself, because something about that felt natural, too.


	2. Chapter 2

**This was my real plot bunny. I just randomly pictured Tony going to see his mom and this is what happened. :) **

When he woke in the morning to a cold, empty bed and the smell of bacon wafting through the house, he smiled and walked into the kitchen to find Ziva in front of the stove, wearing a pair of his old basketball shorts, rolled up, and one of his old OSU t-shirts, tied in a bunch at her back with a rubber band. Her hair was tussled from sleep, and he'd never seen anything more beautiful.

He stood there for a long moment, admiring her, leaning against the kitchen entrance. In the back of his mind, he noted that he wouldn't mind waking up to this every morning, but he shook it off. No matter how much progress had been made in the past few months, he wasn't quite ready to go there just yet. However, he couldn't shake the feeling that, once again, waking up with her cooking breakfast seemed overly natural. To anyone else, it might seem strange, but to him, it seemed like the most normal thing in the world.

And he wasn't sure if that thrilled him or scared him.

Shaking himself out of his thoughts that were drifting towards dangerous territory, he took another step into the kitchen and spoke, his voice still rough with sleep. "Smells good."

She turned around, smiling. "Figured you might could still use some cheering up. Did you sleep okay?"

After she'd asked, she seemed to suddenly recall how they'd spent most of the night, and color found its way into her cheeks.

"I slept well. Did you?" She nodded, ducking her face slightly and handing him a plate with some eggs and a few pieces of bacon on it. "You are phenomenal, Ziva David." He gave her a smile. "Thank you."

She blushed slightly, but turned away before he could appreciate it. He took a piece of bacon off the plate and ate it. She was looking at him again now, and he grinned.

"It's delicious. Did you eat some?" She nodded, and he took another piece off of his plate and held it out in front of her. "Here."

She smiled, taking it. A silence followed, and Tony wondered where this was supposed to go now. Did she just go home? Did they spend the day together, doing random things? He wasn't sure, and he cringed at the awkwardness that would inevitably come when that subject had to be breached.

"So." She began after a moment, before pulling her bottom lip between her teeth. "Uh… I guess I'll… "

He put his plate in the sink, turning back to her. "It's Saturday. Do you really want to go all the way back to your apartment to just sit around and do nothing?"

She pursed her lips, probably wondering how he'd followed her train of thought, especially with the measure of hesitation it contained. After a moment, she answered. "No."

"Alright then. Now either go get dressed so we can do random things or go pick a movie, Zee-vah."

She smiled. "Fine. I'll go get dressed."

He watched her go, suddenly knowing that no matter where they went today, there was one stop he definitely had to make.

"Tony? Where are we going now?" Ziva asked, eyebrows drawn together in confusion.

He hesitated, pulling down a dirt road that he hadn't been down in years. After a moment, their destination appeared and he turned into the drive, pulling around.

He risked a glance at Ziva, and she was staring at the name carved into the stone a few yards out of her window.

**_DiNozzo_**

She looked over at him, clarity making its way onto her features. "Oh." She said softly.

He nodded. "Will you wait here for a minute, please?"

She nodded in return. "Take your time."

He reached up to brush his fingers over her cheek, a rush of emotion making tears sting his eyes. "Thanks, ninja."

He got out of the car and walked to his mother's grave, fighting tears. He knelt down in front of it and stared at the name engraved there.

"Hey mom." He whispered, a tear slipping down his cheek. "How are you doing? I'm doing okay myself, I guess. I'm sorry I haven't been to see you in so long. I really am. "

He stopped, closing his eyes. "I found an old picture of us, and it reminded me of how I missed you. I kinda got upset. And you see the woman sitting in my car over there? She came all the way over to my apartment last night with a pizza, and let me talk about you, and she just listened. She said you were beautiful, by the way."

More tears fell down his cheek, and he looked up. "I think I love her, mom. She's the most amazing person I've ever met, and she gets me better than anyone I've ever known. She kinda reminds me of you, besides the whole ex-assassin thing. But that's not who she is, don't worry. She's a beautiful, intelligent, funny, and she's got a heart of gold, just like you. I really think you would have liked her, if you were still here. I really wish you could have met her, because she means everything to me. I didn't even realize it for the longest time. I overlooked her for so long."

He glanced back at his car, where Ziva was playing with his radio, giving him the privacy he needed. "I bet, if you were here right now, you'd be telling me to go tell her how I feel, because there's no time like the present. You said that a lot. And you're right. And I'll tell her, soon. I promise. For you, mom. Because you always told me that one day I'd find an amazing girl and fall in love with her. And you always told me that when I did, I should tell her, and hold on to her, and never let her go. So I'm going to. Give me some time, though. I am the son of Anthony DiNozzo, Sr. You know how he could be."

He felt some of the weight on his shoulders lighten, and he sighed. "He misses you, too, even though he won't admit it. But it's okay. He's dad, after all. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I miss you, a lot. And tell you about Ziva. Maybe next time I'll bring her over here, too, but this time I needed to be by myself. Understandable, right? I'm going to visit more often, mom. I promise. I'm so sorry that I waited so long to come see you. But I'm going to start getting things right."

He wiped the tears from his cheeks and stood. "I love you, mom. Thanks for watching out for me."

Then, he turned and started the walk back to his car, where Ziva was waiting for him. A breeze blew past him, and he smiled.


End file.
